


ab aeterno

by quietmoon



Series: ab aeterno [2]
Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-27
Updated: 2016-01-27
Packaged: 2020-06-30 09:24:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19850248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quietmoon/pseuds/quietmoon
Summary: He has spent lifetimes chasing her.





	ab aeterno

**Author's Note:**

> _cross-posted from[ff.net](https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11756152/1/ab-aeterno)_
> 
> 'reincarnation au i'll never write' bUT WHAT'S THIS YOU NERD. WHAT'S THIS. In my defence, there is a whole 10k backstory to this fic that I just didn't write out hahaha. Also, one day *clenches fist* I _will_ write smut that isn't just vaguetalk about bruises... _One day._ Excerpt from [25 Lives by Tongari](http://www.shousetsubangbang.com/mirror/25-lives/).

He spends lifetimes chasing her. Or that's how it feels, anyway.

The first time they meet, they're nine years old, and she doesn't love him back. The last time, she's twenty-two and glaring through his doorway with a bruised cheek and black eye, and she does.

And just like that, it ends.

* * *

He knows how to chase, but _she_ knows how to stay. He's spent his whole life running, trying to catch her with eyes glued to the ground, accustomed to racing time. Now that he finally has his arms around her and she's telling him to look up, it's like he's blinded by all the things he would not let himself see before.

To begin with, he's awful at talking about himself.

She gets angry in the beginning, pulling away from him when he can't even manage to bring himself to tell her what he wanted to be when he was little. It's not that he doesn't want to tell her — he just doesn't have anything to say. Or that's what he thinks, anyway, until they've tried a hundred times and she sticks around and starts laughing when he stutters through a determined _i-i liked that show_ , and it's like through loving her he's learning himself.

 _So secretive_ , she purrs into the crook of his neck. _My little mystery, aren't you?_

It takes him a few more blunders like that before he realises that Juvia loves having a puzzle to piece together every single day.

 _Start from the beginning_ , she prompts after a long movie night full of more snide comments from her than even he's accustomed to.

 _There isn't one_ , he tells her. _There never was._

She doesn't understand, of course, because she doesn't remember. Not like he does. He's spent lifetimes chasing her — or is that just what it feels like? — and finally having caught her is a novelty he has no idea how to handle. But he wants to explain, wants to let her know, because he wants her to understand why it is he has chased her for so long. But the words won't come to his lips, so he looks for someone else to tell her how he and she, the two of them, broke time.

* * *

She's upset when he hands her the paper, skimming the first two lines before glaring up at him, eyes demanding _what is this._

 _The beginning, perhaps?_ he offers.

She doesn't know if he's being romantic or foolish — _both? neither?_ — but she disregards it, almost determined not to understand. _I don't want to know. If this has all happened before, I don't want to know._

 _I thought you wanted to know everything..._ It's not that he doesn't understand; it isn't the first time she's turned her back. But it's the first time she's had the choice not to, and it stings more than rejection ever has before.

 _About you_ , she kisses into his collarbone that night, both of their hips bruised in the sweetest way. _About us. Not about chances we never had._ Her smile is softer than he's ever seen it, ever in a thousand years. _We're finally at the real beginning, Gray. Let's be happy about it. Okay?_

Having played her part, Time leaves them, forgets them. An eternity of chasing ends, and tomorrow's colours bleed into today. It is the last lifetime he spends chasing her; and the only one in which he is loved back. And perhaps, consequently, the only one that matters.

 _A beginning_ , he accepts, and does not think of lost lifetimes again. There are, after all, better ways for him to spend his time.

* * *

_ah, but i don't blame you, i'll never burn as brilliantly as you._  
_it's only fair that i should be the one to chase you_  
_across ten, twenty five, a hundred lifetimes  
_ **_until i find the one where you'll return to me._ **


End file.
